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When it comes to keeping secrets the US patent office is perhaps technology’s biggest nemesis and it has struck again with a beauty: ’s application for a flexible and even foldable new iPhone.

Picked up by the eagle-eyed folks at AppleInsider, this week USPTO awarded Apple a wide-ranging patent for "Flexible electronic devices" which "may include a flexible display, a flexible housing and one or more flexible internal components configured to allow the flexible electronic device to be deformed."

In return Apple rewarded us with extensive concept drawings that left no-one in any doubt that it is looking at this technology for an iPhone…

Perhaps the most interesting aspect to the patent, however, is the extent of Apple’s research into a foldable device. Not only does it detail flexible glass and chassis construction, but entirely flexible internals including bendable circuit boards and even batteries.

By contrast existing foldable devices like the LG G Flex, G Flex 2 and Samsung Galaxy Round have a flexible screen and chassis, but their internal components are rigid. As a consequence the Galaxy Round, for example, had to fit a smaller battery than the Galaxy Note 3 upon which it is based.